"[A] job I gained a lot from was being a teacher. When I was still in my twenties, I went back to my old high school, John Burroughs in St. Louis, and taught acting, improv, and public speaking. It was a really progressive school—I felt that they had done so much to set me on a creative course, it was only fair to find a way to pay them back a little. I didn’t have a multimillion-dollar foundation or anything, so I decided I wanted to just give my time in a direct and personal way. And I enjoyed it even more than I thought I would. The students were great, and I found myself learning something from them every day.

The downside is that teachers in general are pretty under-respected and underpaid. That’s a real drag. Investing in higher teacher salaries is one of the most obvious things we could do to improve life in our society. I spent two years teaching drama, and then came back to L.A. Since then, I’ve found a little success, and now I’ve been able to endow a scholarship for John Burroughs students in my mother’s name: the Deborah Garner Hamm Memorial Scholarship. We just helped one kid to graduate college, and another one is working his way through right now. That’s been a gratifying way for me to spend some money."